STATCOUNTER

I’M NOT LAUGHING

It was my wife’s birthday. Along with the usual flowers, dinner and other gifts for she-who-must-be-obeyed, I came across a new item. It was a cake in a box, which came with birthday napkins, candles, forks, even matches. The kicker though, was that when you opened the box, there was a five-second celebration song, followed by a personal birthday greeting, which you have previously recorded via telephone.

Ordered one, and it even came a day early. Though the cake was on the smallish size, all worked as promised. Except…

…the cake box would start playing for no reason at all, yet would often refuse to play when the top was lifted. And at random times the box emitted a series of electronic clucking sounds.

Though it was disappointing, it would not classify as a major, or even minor, tragedy. Still, I did send the company an email, to let them know about the kinks. I was requesting neither a refund nor replacement; it was more of, “just to let you know.”

But then they left me a voicemail, and I am not certain they really understood what they were admitting. Their point was that it is a light-sensitive mechanism, and all the problems I had mentioned were indeed real.

Amazing. What they are saying is that the very reason for the product’s existence, its reason for being, doesn’t really work.

A cake I can get anywhere. Napkins, forks, etc., are also readily available. The “hook” is the music and voice, and to acknowledge that they are aware that it really doesn’t deliver as promised is really astounding. It certainly wasn’t offered as a work in progress.

Yes, I know that “Perfect is the enemy of good.” But what about all that gray area in between?

Would you market your product before it was perfect, or would you settle for good enough? Would you admit its flaws, and offer a discount? Would you just go ahead, willing to annoy a percentage of your customers?